Game of Thrones Discussion S6E7: Second Chances

Renaming, regaining, and recreating identities continued to be the focus during this character-driven season of Game of Thrones. The Girl has reclaimed her identity as Arya Stark, the Hound has morphed back into Sandor Clegane, and Reek edges closer to full-bore Theon Greyjoy 2.0.

In “The Broken Man,” characters try to come to terms with murderous past actions in a world where violence has become the norm, as the themes of resurrection and redemption continue to weave through all the major characters’ story arcs.

Join three fans with different perspectives as they try to make sense of it all: Rosalyn Claret, who has read the books yet says she “forgets” how many times; Laura Fletcher, a casual fan of the television and book series; and Cheryl Collins, who does not read. Maester Corrin Bennet-Kill is on hiatus.

Please join the conversation in comments!

Cheryl
Shall we start with that unusual open? The first shot was of metal being forged, then we see a building under construction, and then — while other logs are toted by four men each, one man carries a log by himself: the Hound. Er, Sandor Clegane.

Laura
I admit I was tipped off, or at least suspicious, that we’d get the Hound back this week because of fan theories that Ian McShane’s guest appearance was coinciding with it, and he was rumored to play a septon like this one.

Cheryl
As a non-book reader, I always assumed all the septons had to be in big official buildings — but Ray seems different.

Laura
I think as an unofficial septon, Ray, is an interesting contrast with the High Sparrow.

Rosalyn
He is different: he is a product of wartime.

Laura
Ray is also a convert to religion and a leader of people who is also anti-violence and bootstraps and all that, but unlike the High Sparrow, he seems balanced, genuine, and scarred by his past.

Cheryl
And Ray has no desire for worldly power.

Rosalyn
Ray is a product of war and violence, the High Sparrow a product of excess and materialism (at least in his own origin story). Both are slipping into spaces created by the breakdown of the social order.

Cheryl
Ray also is non-dogmatic: he admits he doesn’t know which god’s name is right, or what the god or gods is or are. But he feels there is something larger then humans, and that it’s important to do good in the world. My kind of septon.

Rosalyn
And both are supposedly filling needs of the common people left without direction, purpose, resources, or leaders who give a crap about them.

Laura
I liked his points about humility and not knowing the ways of the gods, or even if he had the right ones pegged. Contrast again with the High Sparrow who claims he only carries out the will of the gods: no walk of atonement today, maybe a trial for Cersei tomorrow …

Rosalyn
The kind of septon who says “fuck” a lot. And a former soldier. If any man of faith is going to get through to Sandor Clegane, it would be this kind.

Cheryl
AND a soldier who has came to terms with his past horrible acts.

Laura
It’s beyond good fortune that this is the man who came across Sandor’s dying body. Of all the magic in the show, that’s some of the strangest so far.

We have an obvious parallel between the High Sparrow’s origin story, as told to Margaery, and Ray’s background here.

In what ways was Ray’s story aimed specifically at us, the viewers? What were we supposed to get out of it? There’s a similar speech in the books by a different septon character that’s more focused on the ravages of war (and it literally references “broken men”), but this one was more about his individual shame and guilt.

Rosalyn
That segment in the book made a big impression on me, and this seemed so different as to miss me entirely and make me not recognize it at all. I took it on a purely character-to-character level: Sandor had to hear from someone like himself to even begin to listen.

Cheryl
The speech seemed to address the question, how do you move beyond war and violence? There comes a time when the killing stops. Then what? How do we pick up the pieces of who we are?

It reminded me very much of the speech of the dying man that the Hound and Arya stumble upon and who the Hound puts out of his misery. He basically says that the world is out of whack, out of order — that the karmic wheel is out of balance.

[Editor’s note: In Season 4, Episode 7, the dying man says to the Hound and Arya: “I always held to the notion of fair exchange, in all my dealings. You give me, I give you. It’s fair. A balance. There’s no balance anymore.]

Laura
I’m also reminded of Sandor leaving King’s Landing during the Battle of Blackwater Bay, partly due to fire and his childhood trauma, and partly because he saw it as pointless.

Cheryl
When we saw Ray hanging there, you could see Sandor’s thought bubble: “This is what your nonviolence gets you.” It DID seem crazy that Ray would not even defend himself, as Sandor says.

What’s interesting is that when they are making the building out in the middle of nowhere, we don’t know what they are erecting at first. Only eventually do we realize it is a sept. It is simple, un-magnificent. That building is placed in the background carefully between shots of Ray and the Hound. That raw, bare sept is central. Unadorned. It’s real religion, with no pretension, no aspiration to worldly power. Healthy, and with healthy congregants. The core value is that all that matters is how we treat one another.

Rosalyn
It was interesting that we caught up to Sandor’s story after he’d clearly been there awhile. Mid-transformation. When the opening scene showed them building something, I initially thought it was going to be a watchtower; then I realized it was a sept, and couldn’t believe that the Hound would be contributing to that effort in the middle of a war zone.

And then we realize he’s had a little bit of time there to heal and reflect and listen. We’re meeting a new man, in a way.

Cheryl
One who has been “reborn.”

Rosalyn
“Hate” is what kept him going.

Laura
The last we saw of the Brotherhood was years ago, both in the show’s timeline and in viewers’ minds, and they were a roving band of outlaws that weren’t quite bad, but also kind of rudderless. They had a leader and a religion, at least. The men we saw this episode who killed all the villagers were different, assuming Sandor was right and they were from the Brotherhood. They were certainly sigil-less and espousing Lord of Light propaganda.

Cheryl
And unclear why they would kill that group with women and children.

Laura
Perhaps they’ve become religious extremists? But that doesn’t seem right, since they were clearly after resources.

Cheryl
Ray asks, why would they hurt us? We have no gold. And the Hound says: you have steel, even if you say you don’t. When Sandor took that ax in the last shot, it was the last piece of metal left behind.

That massacre happened in the day, not the night (“the night is dark and full of terrors”). Yet the group was utterly unprepared — kind of like Frey’s sons at Riverrun, who let 8,000 men come right upon them.

Laura
So now we’re at the “violence is a disease” part, right? That made my hair stand on end.

This part of Ray’s speech did resonate, where he talked of committing escalating acts of violence for no real reason, eventually culminating in killing a boy.

Cheryl
Because he was ordered to: just following orders.

Laura
The idea that violence is a force of nature immediately reminded me of the greyscale disease.

Rosalyn
Easily communicable. Ending in madness.

Laura
Ray was ordered to do it. So were these men ordered to kill this village? If so, by whom? And why?

Who is patient zero, if you will, of the Brotherhood now? Has Beric Dondarrion been resurrected so many times that he’s kind of lost it? Or is he dead and they’ve gone rogue?

Rosalyn
Ray says this of the gods, but it could also apply to the warring factions: “Maybe they’re all the same fucking thing.”

Cheryl
Sandor is dealing with guilt, and to me, he’s trying to figure out how much of his identity he can get back without committing the same horrible acts. How much is his nature? It’s the same with Theon.

Sandor listened, really listened, to Ray’s message of redemption. He’s really trying to figure it out — what the hell do I do now? Who am I if I do not kill? If I’ve done bad things, why haven’t I been punished? Why should I not continue to do bad things?

Laura
It seems especially cruel to see a village mowed down not by a particular house, or army, but by (ostensibly) an army without loyalties at all. So, there was no way the villagers could have survived. No oath of fealty could have protected them.

Cheryl
Out in an open area, with no place to hide — utterly defenseless. And they seemed so happy!

Laura
This was a thwarted narrative again, right? I thought Sandor would have to fight those men, and either decide to leave or be forced to do so afterward.

Cheryl
I certainly did not expect them to be massacred.

Rosalyn
Again, I think this core of realism is what makes the Hound stop and pay attention to Ray, who despite his plain speaking is really creating this bizarre pastoral fantasyland that is so at odds with anything the Hound would formerly have patience for. This establishes that he’s in the process of change, which sets the stage for one line that made me stop and take notice and feel for him: “Why haven’t the gods punished me?”

He asks these types of questions combatitively and rhetorically a lot, challenging the high-minded urges of others, but in this case, I think he meant it, asking plaintively. I think he really wanted to know — a glimpse into his vulnerability.

I didn’t see the massacre coming, because I didn’t see why the Brotherhood would do such a thing. “Protecting the people.” Protecting looks a lot like pillaging.

Laura
I’m seeing lots of similarities between Jaime and Sandor here. Asking why they aren’t being punished by the gods (though Jaime was being more of a smartass when he asked this of the High Sparrow earlier this season), both have meandering journeys that led to personal growth, either with or looking for Stark daughters, and both have important interactions with Brienne.

Cheryl
Great point, Rosalyn. I think Sandor is trying to figure out how to live, really live. Up until now he has been a killing machine. As you say, he really did seem to listen with open heart to the “sermon.” Not only is the Hound not punished, he has received a second chance of life.

I also think it is important that the episode jumped from Theon, to Winterfell, to the Hound, to Arya.

Somehow these fates are being tied up, in lands that are neither north nor south — midpoint, as it were — in autumn. And midseason.

Laura
Jaime and Sandor are now both in the Riverlands, for whatever that’s worth, smack dab in the middle of the Westeros map.

It’s the gray area!

Sandor references his earlier encounter with the Brotherhood without Banners during one of his first conversations with Ray: when Ray says the gods aren’t done with him, he said, “I’ve heard that before. A man was talking about a different god, though.” That was after the Hound won the duel with Beric Dondarrion.

Cheryl
On to Riverrun?

Rosalyn
Bronn looking ever more like he has a personal shopper every episode, but still conspicuously armed to the teeth. Poor Edmure, no good even as a hostage. Even with those second-rate Frey sons, with their hapless Eeyore ear hats.

Cheryl
Those guys’ hats might as well say “dunce.”

Rosalyn
Last episode Cersei swore that Jaime would be “back at the head of the Lannister army, where you belong,” and I was looking forward to that. But he still seems sort of aimless and silly.

His besting the Frey bro with a juvenile “What if I punch you now?” battle of “wits” was not … impressive.

Cheryl
His heart does not seem in it, that’s for sure.

Rosalyn
For a moment I thought we were going to get the old Jaime back. Confident, bored as shit, offhandedly dangerous. Dorne Jaime really threw me off. I think this scene was trying to capture that but the writing for him was just not great. I miss the old Jaime.

I think the Blackfish knows that the Freys are desperate second sons under great pressure to take the castle, and Edmure was their best hope, so he calls their bluff. Or he really DGAF.

Cheryl
Jaime seems weary of it all. But once again we have scenes with a bajillion tents … so battle is brewing.

Rosalyn
Weary, I understand. He’s just sort of somewhere between the original love-to-hate literal golden boy Jaime Lannister and the character with the amazing evolution he had on the road with Brienne, and the result is just sort of boring.

Cheryl
It seems clear that this was all set up, which is largely what this whole episode was about.

Rosalyn
So much setup.

Laura
Old-Jaime would’ve been itching for action. Even this time, when Bronn asked if Jaime wanted to parley or fight, Jaime tried to turn it around like he didn’t want to hurt the Blackfish, but we know the real reasons: his hand, and his war-weariness.

Rosalyn
Yes; one is reminded that he never had reason to fear single combat in the past.

Cheryl
Shall we move to Yara and Theon in Volantis?

Laura
I’m not sure that setting up Yara as a lecherous lesbian does much for representation on the show, but mehhhh, the writers probably think it does.

Rosalyn
For one night, Yara’s a sailor at port.

Cheryl
Lecherous? I thought she was just horny, and healthy in expression of her desires. A much different attitude toward sexuality than “congress requires patience, not desire.”

She has a healthy, unashamed sexuality — specifically NOT for procreation — as the High Sparrow was pushing on Margaery.

Rosalyn
I wondered about that, Laura. I thought about it for a while last night. One thing to note is that it is a change from the books, on one level, where Yara didn’t have a woman lover.

Ultimately I hope it was a change in service of representation, not titillation, and for me it was true enough to how the character behaves in the book, and the actress sold it for me.

Laura
Yara definitely sold it as a character, and I didn’t dislike it — more it just rubbed me the wrong way in the context of the rest of the show.

Rosalyn
I really like book Yara, I’ll say again. This representation is true to the spirit of the character in a number of ways, but to me that makes the changes all the more pointed and perhaps meaningful. Book-Yara wasn’t visiting brothels, but she did have dalliances with men, described in detail and also alluded to in her past: basically, a level of freedom exactly equal to men. Maybe the most balanced sexual/romantic dynamic in the Seven Kingdoms outside of Dorne. (And of course the Dornish are exoticized as licentious and hedonistic; the culture of the Iron Islands could not be more opposite, and yet!)

Book-Yara’s relationships were unofficial and unmediated, but not secret or shameful. Her male lovers were neither the source of her power nor a threat to her power; they were just a part of her life. In other words, normal for the men in this universe, but completely anomalous for well-born women. Point being, it’s totally consistent for the character to be depicted having sexual appetites and acting on them, but part of me also thinks the original gender dynamics were important because they were intriguingly unique in GoT. I’m happy with the show’s version because it seems true to show-Yara, and creates a more complete universe, but also think the change is worth discussing.

Cheryl
Knowing nothing about the books, again, I thought it worked fine and it all seemed in character. But much more interesting to me was the internal process of Theon here.

Theon, like Sandor, is trying to find out what life is like after committing terrible acts and finding that somehow you have been given a second chance.

Laura
How cool was it when Yara basically accused Theon of being a phony, and demanding the “real” Theon come back, because she needs him.

That’s as close to touching as it got, though, since then she asked him to kill himself if he couldn’t shape up!

Rosalyn
That was pretty extreme. I got the sense, though, that part of it was driven by her pragmatic need for his aid, but part of it was true care and love.

Cheryl
To me, she was saying, you have one foot in life and one in death — pick a path. You can’t have both. Come back and join the living — drink up! — and find the “real” Theon. This is very similar to Sandor’s conundrum, because of course the “real” Theon has done awful things of which he is deeply ashamed.

Laura
Really, what else would work with Theon at this point? He is practically at the brink of death — he openly fantasized about hanging at the gates of Winterfell, after all.

Rosalyn
And she has no patience for/does not understand the true weight of his guilt and his own feeling that he is a penitent forever more, unable to make up for his errors and crimes.

Laura
“Fuck justice, we’ll get revenge” was a beautifully delivered line. Only on Game of Thrones could I find that touching!

Cheryl
He is trying to figure a way out of the box: to regain his identity fully, and fully absorb what that identity has done: to cleanse his sins. How to be fully alive, fully Theon, and accept the terrible things Theon has done?

Rosalyn
It made me think of Theon’s other interaction with someone who could also be said to be his sister: Sansa. Their moment of tenderness and almost clinging to each other when parting ways. Sansa did understand what he had been through, closer to it than anyone else in the world now.

Cheryl
My sense is not that he was fantasizing about hanging in Winterfell — but that’s what he considers justice would be for him. Just like Sandor, he is trying to come to terms with his deserved “punishment.”

Not sure if you know anyone or have experience with extreme depression, but it is this: you are neither dead nor alive, but in some netherworld.

Laura
Again, that gray zone, limnal space. Transition, and beyond that —an all-or-nothing turning point.

Cheryl
And both Sandor and Theon are there. It’s like Jaime after his hand was cut off.

Rosalyn
And trying to find their place again when facing a scene that used to be perfectly in their element, and being unable to seize it. Jaime as a swordsman. Theon in the brothel. (Remember early season Theon?)

Cheryl
Redemption after being given a second chance. Ray says “it’s never too late to come back” — just as Yara is saying here, too.

The brothel is such a stinging reminder of all he has lost, all the parts of himself, literally and figuratively.

Rosalyn
We have some big things to tackle! What do you make of Jon and Sansa’s evolving dynamics on the Snow-Stark Barnstorming Tour?

Cheryl
I think Sansa is showing some not-great characteristics. And she seems impatient and threatened by Davos.

Laura
Neither she nor Jon fully realized how many bridges Robb burned.

Cheryl
That’s really true, isn’t it? We’ve forgotten all that, it was so long ago.

Rosalyn
I think Jon grasped it slightly more. When Sansa tries for imperiousness with Glover, Jon winces visibly. I’m not sure if he knows how to read the Lord, or what, but he knows it’s not going to work.

Laura
Robb not only burned bridges, he literally burned through soldiers. There aren’t all that many left apart from the Boltons and their allies.

Poor Sansa. In the back of her mind, she realizes that she knows where to find troops (the ones Littlefinger offered from the Vale) but has already passed them up.

Rosalyn
I thought about that, Laura, how many troops have been lost, in the scene where we encounter Lady Lyanna Mormont. How between Robert’s Rebellion and the War of the Five Kings, this is now a world of great houses filled only with their second sons and daughters, generations lost to battle, leaders who thought they would never rule.

(Remember Ned Stark was one such too. His elder brother Brandon was supposed to become Lord of Winterfell and wed Catelyn. He was killed by the Mad King and the rest is history.)

Question: do you trust Littlefinger? Would you, if you were Sansa? He was publicly aligned with the Lannisters before turning to rouse the Vale.

Laura
I never trust him. And I think it was strongly implied that Sansa was writing to Littlefinger to ask for those troops after all, when she pens that note and seals it with the direwolf, but she realizes what it will cost her.

I think Littlefinger knows what he’ll be owed if he marches to the Starks’ aid.

Cheryl
I am not quite sure that she is writing to Littlefinger.

Rosalyn
Still, why does she send the raven in secret?

Laura
The only thing one can count on with Petyr Baelish is self-interest. And Sansa sort of forgot that that’s how all people work, when she went all in with the Glover lord.

Sending it in secret was another clue to me that it was for Littlefinger, since only she (and absent Brienne) knows about these troops nearby, and as Rosalyn remembered, it may be still a terrible idea to send ravens at all. They suspected the Boltons were intercepting them.

Cheryl
I think she is sending in secret because she is a newbie authority figure who knows nothing about war but thinks what she is doing is right and thus that makes it OK.

As we noted before we started the chat, Glover made sure to remind us of the “foreign whore” that Robb was married to: it’s a really negative view of Volantis, which is where the Theon and Yara are now.

Rosalyn
The Northern families have suffered, but one wonders if Lord Glover could be compelled by realizing how much suffering Ramsay is capable of inflicting. I thought Sansa would open her mouth to make that case.

Laura
Yes, we’re reminded that “the North remembers” is not always a good thing.

Rosalyn
What about the opening scene? Jon winning over the Wildlings? With an assist from Tormund?

Cheryl
Well, Glover did not like the foreign whore from Volantis, so he sure as hell was not going to like the Wildings. Jon has a long row to how, to pull the North together and actually lead.

Laura
Jon knows how to appeal to self-interest. The free folk, as the Wildlings call themselves, aren’t loyal to anyone. Just the fact that Jon saved them once isn’t enough; it helps that this is the way for them to survive. They’re pragmatic, and if not loyal, they’re true to their word.

Cheryl
Pulling the Northerners together into a fighting group was easy for Robb, but he fucked up — and now it’s the bastard and the daughter and a bunch of Wildings who have the North’s fate on their shoulders.

Rosalyn
Although it does seem to matter that Tormund then moves in with “You owe him one AND you’ll be a coward if you don’t.” I loved how Tormund saw his opening and took it.

Cheryl
Jon’s case is pretty compelling.

Rosalyn
I liked the dig at, well, pretty much the entire rest of everyone else ever. “We’re not clever like you southerners … if we say we’ll do something, we’ll do it.”

I remain fascinated by their self-governance process. I guess sometimes it doesn’t turn out so great, but they seem pretty good at standing around in a circle and letting a few speaking parts determine consensus. They used that method at Hardhome, too.

Cheryl
And Sansa is not loving Davos.

Rosalyn
I thought your word choice was astute: Sansa is “threatened” by Davos.

Laura
Yeah, poor Sansa’s radar is a bit busted. There are many, many more suspicious people around than Davos, who’s the straightest shooter of them all!

Rosalyn
She does come off as a bit petty. Everything she says about Stannis is true (when they’re discussing where to camp) but no one questions Stannis’s chops as a commander. She’s in a world that Davos and Jon know. Catelyn annoyed everyone with her battlefield opinions, too.

Laura
Davos was basically Stannis’s understudy, just as Bronn is to Jaime. He knows almost everything that Stannis knew.

Cheryl
Great point. Robb — the golden boy, the first son — really opened the doors for all the disasters that followed, and now when the case is so much more true and compelling, the stakes so much higher, it’s so much harder to win over anyone.

Rosalyn
And we have Jon’s and Sansa’s competing visions for success: Sansa wants to do it right so they don’t suffer defeat. Jon says, “We fight with the army we have,” i.e., don’t let perfect be the enemy of good, and also, winter is coming. AHEM DID YOU NOTICE THAT WINTER IS COMING HAVE I MENTIONED THAT.

Laura
Sansa needs to channel that crafty survivorness she keeps referencing. But I think it’s harder than she thought it would be. If I’m generous to the writing here, maybe it’s exploring how hard it is to overcome all the trauma.

Cheryl
But I still do not understand why the hell Jon does not try to get the troops from the Vale — he sent ravens everywhere else but not there. Why? Plot hole?

Rosalyn
I think he doesn’t know about the “regime change” in the Vale, and certainly doesn’t know that they’re so close at hand, Cheryl.

Cheryl
This all feels a bit slapdash, plot-wise.

Laura
Anyway, LADY MORMONT!

Cheryl
Only Davos knows how to talk to her. Obviously Davos’s skills are in the real world, not theoretical.

Laura
That was some Shireen flashback realness. Sad.

Rosalyn
I like how both Sansa and Jon try different varieties of patronizing. Sansa thinking she’s got this in the bag, being able to talk to a girl (Jon looks at her desperately), and Jon thinking he’s special because he knew her family.

I had the same thought about Shireen. But then it made me think, c’mon, Jon, don’t you remember dealing with ARYA? Helloooo.

Cheryl
Good segue to Arya.

Has she not been paying attention to what the Faceless Men do? Arya now has embraced her old identity and is back in her old clothes and is her old smart-alecky self. She decides to take in a scenic view over a bridge with the sun setting, while that “lighthearted Braavos” music plays. A delightful moment. But even I felt caution as the old woman approached — why didn’t Arya? Once again, Game of Thrones uses the music to confuse and confound our expectations.

Laura
I know we got lots of dramatic irony with the Braavos scenes, where we saw things that Arya didn’t (like the Waif lurking backstage when Arya fudged the assassination), but c’mon. Why wasn’t she being more careful? She should’ve stayed in that dark, single-candle-lit room a lot longer! Like until her stupid ship left port!

Rosalyn
Why the cockiness, Arya? I never trusted her abilities against the House of Black and White, but she doesn’t even seem scared or wary. Maybe she just feels good being herself again.

The question is, where will she go now (if she survives)? To the players who owe her one, now that she saved Lady Crane’s life?

Cheryl
YES, she’ll go to the players.

Rosalyn
And how did the Waif not actually kill her? One thinks the Waif does not often miss and would know exactly where to strike.

Laura
Gut stabs are excruciatingly painful and usually fatal, but basically the inverse of what Jaqen told the Waif to do. “Usually” may even be overstating it.

Cheryl
But after being reminded of the internal struggles of Theon and Sandor this episode, I am much happier that Arya escaped without killing anyone that she regretted.

Rosalyn
So the Waif was more interested in causing suffering and taking out her aggression than capturing a new face. Wellity wellity.

Laura
Jaqen threatened Arya by saying that she would get a second chance, not a third, and either way there would be a new face for the hall. Lady Crane’s face or Arya’s, was the implication.

Cheryl
So, what about Margaery and the High Sparrow?

Rosalyn
I thought so much about Margaery. I rewound her first scene with the High Sparrow about eight times and then did the same thing with her scene with Olenna.

Cheryl
So, we were on the right track last week … her behavior is a long con.

Rosalyn
There she is, hands folded neatly, arranging herself into a pose without glancing up when the High Sparrow enters, but some expression flicks across her face when she hears his voice.

Laura
She’s also legitimately trapped. The High Sparrow knows it, too.

Rosalyn
That’s my big question. Does he know it? Does he care? Does she really expect him to buy this? Is he?

Laura
But he knows he has the right strings on the right puppets, and Margaery is stuck.

Rosalyn
I think they are attempting to play each other, but the High Sparrow is coming out on top. But watching it happen is fascinating.

Laura
I think their interaction about the “marriage bed” shows he’s in on the secret.

Rosalyn
I thought so, too. At first I wondered if Margaery’s game was to treat him like any other man she can wrap around her finger: flatter his deepest-held vision of himself by becoming the perfect convert.

Cheryl
And he threatens Olenna if she does not comply. He does understand that Olenna is the biggest button he can push with her.

Rosalyn
When she sat next to him, she kept her hand open and on her lap prominently, there for the taking. I read it all as a very subtle attempted seduction on her part, honestly, and wondered for a second if the High Sparrow would fall for it due to hubris and pride and smugness at his creation.

He seemed to take the bait for a fleeting moment when he touched her hand, and she saw it, thought she’d scored a point. Then he let the threat drop casually about Olenna. No way. Either he knows what she’s up to (if that’s what she was up to), or he’s truly impermeable to “womanly charms.”

Laura
That Olenna threat was key. The High Sparrow already has Loras, and now he makes sure she knows he can have her grandmother, too.

Cheryl
And then she goes to see Olenna. I think when Olenna walked out, that is the first time I actually saw Margaery lose her composure, even for a moment.

Rosalyn
I think Margaery knows she’s being watched at every moment, is perhaps still hoping for an opportunity to succeed in manipulating the High Sparrow, but in the meantime is committed to her performance. Her talents lie in being protean and adapting herself to a series of power players, and this is just the latest one. He may have recognized that he has a keen tool in her, as I speculated last time.

Margaery is attempting to control the High Sparrow by appealing to his vanity: his success at getting her to atone. Meanwhile, the High Sparrow is playing the same game: he is letting Margaery think she’s gaining a foothold by appealing to her vanity as a master manipulator. They’ve each pinpointed what they perceive as the greatest point of pride in the other, and are seeking to flatter that sense for the purpose of control. It is fascinating.

Cheryl
Right! She is highly useful for his purposes.

Rosalyn
I took her modesty/demurring as her version of seduction in that situation. Being the vision of gentle womanhood that the High Sparrow would long to guide somehow, and thus introducing the topic.

She’s facilitating intimacy while attempting to embody the High Sparrow’s perfect creation, taking advantage of what in a normal person would be hubris.

Cheryl
But Olenna gets the hint and makes plans to leave King’s Landing — but not before calling Cersei the vilest persons she’s ever met.

Rosalyn
Do you think Septa Unella buys it? Hmm.

Laura
Margaery wants to save Olenna, but also realizes that without her around, she’s even more at the mercy of the Faith Militant. Scary.

Rosalyn
She succeeds in saving her grandmother. But the High Sparrow succeeds in dismantling another piece of his opposition.

Cheryl
The perfect woman: chaste, obedient, religious.

This is the first time we’ve seen her in that crown, right?

Rosalyn
What is up with her outfit? Crowned but chaste. Plain but fine and well-made. Humble clothes but another step up the ladder from the last time we saw her, a slightly cleaned-up prisoner for Tommen’s visit.

Laura
Certainly leaving behind the Tyrell style.

Rosalyn
And she even fooled Olenna enough to cause Olenna real pain, when she thought she’d lost her granddaughter and was being dismissed on top of it.

Cheryl
In that long blue dress, she looked like the Virgin Mary.

Rosalyn
With her hair simply styled.

Rosalyn
Margaery’s best performance, was reserved for the High Sparrow, and maybe Tommen. Acting, but with enough truth to be credible.

Cheryl
And Olenna and Cersei?

Rosalyn
Olenna was of course right on in everything she said to Cersei, but I still couldn’t help but think she should be more careful. She is either just so fed up she doesn’t care or she truly believes Cersei won’t find a way to exact revenge further.

Cheryl
Interestingly, Cersei too admits guilt to her — at allowing the High Sparrow to take control — but clearly her response to it is more violence. She is the anti-Ray.

Laura
Cersei was almost too calm, really.

Cheryl
Olenna feels that Cersei poses zero threat now. “You’ve lost.”

Rosalyn
But she says, “I love my son. It is the only truth I know.” I believe it, by now.

Cheryl
I think we agree that this episode was mostly setup for what is to come.

Rosalyn
Made especially clear by the army-gathering campaign stops. And the Hound back on the loose.

Cheryl
I just keep coming back to that half-built sept as being the center of a wheel, around which all of Westeros is turning (figuratively, of course).

Rosalyn
And the Hound is sadly confirmed in his original worldview. Kill or be killed. Margaery is playacting at being devout, but I don’t think Sandor was.

Cheryl
Ray and the rest were killed because they did not prepare or defend themselves — that is different from acting with violence aggressively.

We’ll see what Sandor’s path is now — but I doubt he is going right back to the old Hound.

Rosalyn
That’s a fine line that the Hound hasn’t walked before. He spent a lot of time with Arya telling her that only the strong would survive.

“Devout” is too strong a word, but I don’t think he was faking how Ray made him consider things anew.

Cheryl
Also, the group of people who were building the sept —- they all looked happy! Healthy! Smiling! Laughing! When’s the last time we’ve seen a group of people do that who were not in a brothel?

Rosalyn
Yeah, where did we get this random group of well-fed peaceful people?

Laura
Hopeful, too. Were they all former criminals? It seemed like most were, based on the sermon?

Rosalyn
I guess themes of redemption are sprinkled throughout the episode. This felt a bit like a grab-bag to me.

Cheryl
We were once again mostly moving pieces forward into place in this episode, it seems.

Squawks

Laura
It’s interesting how many characters Brienne has met. Other than Jaime, I think she’s been introduced to the most geographic areas and families. And now that they’re about to meet again (confirmed by previews for next week), what can they tell each other?

Cheryl
The last time we saw the Brotherhood without Banners, they were scraggly, underfed, and ragtag. These leather and fur-trimmed guys on their sleek horses (if they are the Brothers) seem like the Westerosi version of a motorcycle gang. What has happened to them in the interim?

Please join the conversation in comments! But no spoilers, please!